2010 Meetings

Yuri Maller

January 15, 2010

We will begin the new year with a presentation by Yury Maller, who has traveled extensively throughout the world covering electric transport systems, with an emphasis on Eastern European systems. In anticipation of ERA’s upcoming Tramways in Romania tour in May, Yury put together a show on Romanian systems he visited in the past 10 years.

Romania has gone through many changes on its way from a backwater communist dictatorship in 1989 to a member of the European Union in 2007. Transit operations have also evolved and no longer look like relics straight out of the early 20th century. Despite limited resources, local operators are attempting to do away with odd communist-era equipment. In the mean time, many systems act as working transit museums with diverse collections of second-hand trams and trolleybuses from the 1950-70s that formerly operated in Germany, Switzerland, Austria, France and the Netherlands.

Yuri’s presentation will cover all 16 cities ERA is planning to visit in May, matching the order of the trip’s itinerary. He will touch upon the transit history for each city, and give members a much needed summary on their diverse rolling stock. Systems that will not be visited by ERA and those that were recently closed will also be reviewed. If time allows, the show will be rounded up with a teaser on some Siberian systems in Russia that Yury covered during his recent trans-Siberian adventure.

• January 2010 Meeting Notice
• May 2010 Romania Tour Flyer